Kuwaemasu
by KingIradescense
Summary: "Oh right! Come on, let's go!" I immediately hopped to my feet, and Lance immediately took off, with me in tow. Before I knew it, we were driving away from True Cross Town, to far, far away. Of course, this isn't goodbye forever. Lance and I both knew that very well. (T as usual, blah blah blah. Don't be mad about the English name. It gets explained inside.)
1. Death?

~Rin's POV~

Pent up frustration fueled my run through 'THAT' part of town. It's just strange to feel so helpless in a matter. It feels like a bucket of magma inside my chest being tipped every time anger and helplessness are combined.

It's not fair. It's not my fault! I had no say! I never ASKED for this!

My foot went flying into the side of the now-dented-and-airborne-trash can.

But it won't last.

"It's just not fair!" My fist flew into the wall and my foot found another trashcan. I huffed, and continued walking through the god-forsaken streets of homeless people, beggars, dealers, druggies, and everything in between. A lot of them were watching me, seeing as I was wearing the expensive uniform of the Academy. Some of them, I could tell were thinking of ways to pickpocket me, from the looks on their faces, and their snide comments to each other. Some looked at me in pity, for what might happen to me if I stayed too much longer. I could protect myself, but I didn't want to come home with scrapes and a possibly-ruined uniform. Others looked at me in hope, for that I would come out fine or that I would come and donate to them. The rest just completely ignored me, which I was totally fine with.

I kicked the door to an empty building in, the rotting wood and hinges causing it to fall off with only a small amount of force.

"Y'ello?" The echo of my own voice came back to ring in my ears.

"Guess he's not here." With a short turn on me heel and a few strides, I turned the corner and walked down a different street.

"Where is he?" I started to become frustrated again. Not for the same reasons as before, but because I was given a time and unspecified place in the slums to meet up with the person I'm looking for.

It's not some random guy I bumped into in the middle of the street. Well, at first it was, but we kept meeting up and bumping into each other until we were... not quite friends, but not acquaintances either. It's like a friendly co-worker, or business partner kind of relationship. I began to scan my surroundings for the brown-haired, brown-eyed, slightly-purple-tuxedo, dark purple dress shoe-wearing, tall, muscular man with a bit of stubble on his chin. A quick glance at my watch told me that Yukio would be headed to the dorm soon. Yukio and I had a little deal; I would stay in the dorm until he came back from his extracurricular after-school activities, so I could tell him where I was going before I left. Even if I left a note, he would still worry. Some part of me tried to convince itself that he was just worried for my well-being. The other part of me told me it was for the well-being of the others. Wouldn't want a powerful demon running around with nobody knowing where they were, would we? Anyway, I had to be back at the dorm in about 40 minutes. Yukio would be back in about 50.

Right then, there was some shuffling behind me, as though there was somebody walking briskly towards me. With a glance over my shoulder, I immediately recognized the man as the one I had been looking for.

"Lance! Finally!" The foreign name rolled awkwardly off my tongue. Lance was an immigrant, but had never bothered for a name change. It wasn't too hard to say, anyway. If I said it too many times, though, I would easily confuse myself. Though, I guess that's no surprise to anybody else.

"Sorry I'm late," was his strange-sounding response. He spoke Japanese fluently, so it wasn't his words that were off. It was just his foreign accent that made the pronunciation sound off. I could understand it, most of the time, but sometimes it threw off the accent so much that I couldn't understand what he was saying.

"Care to tell?" He flashed me a smirk.

"Not in the slightest." Sigh. Typical Lance.

"So, are we going to get down to business or not? I honestly doubt it. With your tardiness, we've no time to go anywhere except drive around for 40 minutes." I shifted over into a different 'type' of speech I had been working on. It wasn't very different than that I normally spoke, there were just a few added conjunctions.

"Oh, yes, I suppose you are right. To the car, then."

After a few minutes, we were seated in Lance's Smart Fortwo Cabriolet. He was currently trying to make the car start; sometimes he had some trouble with it, as it he would have to turn it on and off several times before it would actually stay on. Eventually, though, he managed to get it to stay on, went into reverse for a few meters, made a u-turn, and a left turn right after that.

"Is this why you were late? You couldn't bring your car into the slums?"

"Nah. Some of the streets are too narrow. And I would've had to ditch it somewhere to keep going; not something I would want to do."

"Ah."

I whistled in appreciation as to how well the car was running in comparison to how it was sometimes. "So, when it is going down?"

"In 2 or 3 weeks."

"2 or 3 weeks?"

"Patience, Kuwaemasu-san(1). A believable act like the one your trying to pull off doesn't come just like that." He removed his left hand from the steering wheel to snap his fingers for emphasis, then returning his hand back to the steering wheel to merge onto the highway, only to get off on an exit on the other side of the highway about 5 minutes later.

"So, how is it going to go down, Kuwaemasu-san? A fire? Electrocution? Drowning? Murder?"

"Mm... I was thinking more along the lines of suicide. Purposely stab the wrong side of the chest, where there would be heated blood packs on the inside of the shirt, so there would be so much blood they wouldn't be able to locate the source of the injury. Afterwards, somebody would 'steal' the 'deceased body'."

"Good plan... How long did it take you to come up with that?"

"Not very long, for certain... reasons." Lance gave me a sad, knowing smile.

"It'll still require practice thought. And a high-pain tolerance level, seeing as how a real injury would have to be made to continue the blood flow."

"I don't care. As long as it's done." Lance shrugged to this, and I checked my watch again.

"We have to go back to the dorms. Yukio's going to be back in about 10 minutes."

"Don't worry about it, we'll be there in time."

"...You've been detouring to the dorms this whole time, haven't you?"

"Yes!" He said happily, and I couldn't help but grin at this. A little less than 10 minutes later, Lance pulled up in front of the dorms, just as Yukio rounded the corner. As soon as he saw us, he began running.

"Ah, shit... He's gonna bombard me... with so many... fucking questions..." I rubbed my temples, practically feeling the pain of the oncoming headache from the barrage already as I slammed the door. Just as Lance began to pull away, he grinned and called back with a wave,

"Later Kuwaemasu-san!"

"Don't call me that!"

"Whatever!" I could hear him laughing as he got farther and farther away.

Yukio finally reached me and threw me against the wall, holding me against the wall by the shoulders. "What's going on here? Who was he?" As soon as my head connected with the wall, the headache really began.

"Watch it." I growled out of instinct, rubbing my head, accidentally scaring Yukio.

"Who was that guy?"

"None of your business, Yukio." It came out as a growl again, but was quieter. Yukio, having been startled even more, cautiously reached one hand towards his belt, hardening his expression.

"Don't bother with the gun." With a small shove, he was trying not to fall back a few feet away from me.

"I'll be on the roof, if you need me." Before Yukio could respond, I had left.

 **11 Days Later**

~Yukio's POV~

I couldn't help but stare at the body in front of me, so covered in blood that we couldn't find the wound. He was grinning. He was still alive. He was grinning at us while we returning looks of horror and desperation.

"...Why?" was all I could say as I rushed around, trying to find some way to stop the blood spewing all over his chest, while Shiemi searched for his sword. If his sword unsheathed, his demon regenerative abilities would kick in, stronger than usual, and that would be enough to save him, right? He didn't bother to answer, but slowly turned his gaze on me.

Despite that he is slowly dying, his eyes are remaining in focus. He's hardly faded in, yet, he is fading.

"Please hold on a bit longer!" Cried Shiemi from the other side of the room. Finally, a response came forth from his lips.

"No." He shook his head slowly. "This is too good a fate." I immediately understood his grin.

He's happy to go.

Shiemi realized it, too. The other exwires weren't here to see this. Shiemi just came over with some of the supplies I ordered from the Exorcist Shop a few days ago, and she came inside to have some tea. Everything was fine until I heard a startled 'yelp' from Kuro and a loud crashing noise, as though something large had been knocked over.

I called his name once.

Twice.

Thrice.

No response.

I thought he was toying with me. That he was just playing around with Kuro, even.

An "I'm coming up there!" came out of my mouth, and I went into our room, when I first saw it.

"Shiemi! Bring the herbs! Quickly!" came bellowing out of my mouth as I began to search for the wound, but I couldn't see anything except red.

Everything was too red to really see him.

The floor was red.

My hands were red as I tried to stop the bleeding.

His clothes were red.

It was sickeningly red.

It was scary.

Here we are now, Shiemi searching for the sword and I still trying to search for the wound so I could treat it as quickly as possible.

"I'm sorry!" Shiemi had stopped looking, knowing he was too close to death for the sword to make a difference. She began sobbing furiously and gripped his hand. Both of us knew any chance of survival was a long shot, but I was still trying. Shiemi, still crying, lifted his hand to her face and held it dearly. At this, he frowned.

"Shiemi, please don't cry." His voice gently urged, as his hand weakly cradled the right side of her face, wiping away a few tears with his thumb. She opened her eyes, tears still falling.

"Please don't be sad." He gave her a gentle grin, and then turned his head to look at me.

"Don't let me see you cry, either," he joked, another smile forming on his face. I didn't see how that was funny in any way. When seeing my reaction, a frown replaced the grin, yet again.

"Look after them all... Please?" The demon regenerative abilities he possessed, even without the sword, were drawing out his death for an awfully long time, but it was clear he wouldn't make it, by his closing eyes and sleepy expression.

"Okay..." I gripped his hand with both my hands. "I'll do it. I promise." Another grin spread across his face.

"Thank you." His eyes closed, and he fell still.

Rin is dead.

 **Following Day**

~Rin's POV~

Here I am, laying in a coffin, pretending to be dead, at my own funeral that was held at the monastery where I and Yukio had grown up in. Nearly everybody gave a testimony, from the clergymen to Yukio to the students, and even Mephisto said a few words.

"He had a noble goal, and one that will definitely be remembered and attempt to be fulfilled throughout the years. Let this be an example to us," he cast a look at the section where the exwires and Yukio were, "to always give a chance, and then, a second chance, and more chances beyond that." With a curt bow he finished and sat down. The last one up was Lance, who walked up to the open coffin on the stand and placed a small box inside, before beginning his testimony. In case you are wondering, I could tell it was him by the voice I heard when they began speaking.

"Now, I don't know any of you, nor any of you I, but Rin was a dear friend of mine. Now that he is gone, it feels like a special something is missing from my life." He was following the script perfectly. I just hope he hurries up... this position is stifling and making me restless.

"I understand many people disliked him for his... position. Even though my job requires me to know which weapons best affect demons, I could not help but be friends with him. The title given to him by everyone around him just did not match his personality. The cheeriness that practically radiated off of him told a different story... yet, some people could not see that." This script is sounding longer now, but it's nearly over. I just need to stay in place.

"When I received news that he had deceased, taken his own life, no less, I could not believe it. He seemed so happy on the outside. It seems as though he did a good job in pretending to be happy. My only hope for him is that he found what he was looking for in death." He turned around and bent over the coffin, and I felt a small vibration as he placed a box alongside me in the coffin. I barely cracked my eye open, to see Lance grinning discreetly at me; I knew they had believed it. Then, he gently closed the coffin.

"Finally!" I exclaimed silently, opened the box to reveal an oxygen tank connected to a mask, then to strap the mask to my head and turn the valve, careful to check the regulator first. I felt the coffin be lifted up and carried, as the ends were constantly being moved up and down. Eventually, the coffin stopped moving, and was suddenly lowered until it hit a surface with a thud. I could hear a repeated shovel sound effect from above me, and about 2 seconds after each sound effect, something would hit the roof of the coffin above me. All I could do was keep breathing and wait. Lance said he'd come about 3 hours after the funeral ends. There were about 4 hours on this.

Before I knew it, I found myself drifting into a sleep.

"Wake up!" I felt something cold suddenly hit my face.

"Wah!" I jolted awake, to find that I was in front of Lance on the ground, by the monastery. From what I could see, the dirt in the grave had already been put back, so I could only assume that the coffin had been reburied already, with the tank nowhere to be seen.

"You fell asleep in the coffin."

"Well, no shit, Sherlock." Sometimes, Lance used this expression around me, and it didn't take me long to figure out what it meant.

"Don't be rude. Come on, before one of the clergymen find us." I suddenly realized we were still in the cemetery.

"Oh right! Come on, let's go!" I immediately hopped to my feet, and Lance immediately took off, with me in tow. Before I knew it, we were driving away from True Cross Town, to far, far away.

Of course, this isn't goodbye forever.

Lance and I both knew that very well.

* * *

 **Like I said, getting most of my stories out. I think I'll start updating weekly, unless it's a new story, or it's a finish update. Don't worry, it's probably a lie. I'll probably find myself updating every 2 or 3 days.**

 **(1) Kuwaemasu is the Japanese translation of the English word 'Add'. People who know anything about the playable characters in Elsword probably know what that even means. It's not really a crossover, though, because it's not totally based around the game. I can't tell you what is similar though, since Idon't wanna give ya'll spoilers.**

 **Das vedania!**

 **Haven't said that in so long.**

 **OH! That reminds me.**

 **I die a little inside when I don't get reviews . Please review! I take constructive criticism!**


	2. Arrival

**1 Year After 'Death'**

~Kuwaemasu's POV~

The sound of a zipper snapped me out of my daze, and the churning of gears told me that I was being lowered, bringing me out of the darkness I had been sitting in for awhile. Light filled my gaze as the wires gently untangled themselves from my arms and legs. When I looked up, I saw Lance, wearing a hazmat suit, approach me.

"So, how do you feel?" He didn't look me in the face, but instead gripped my arm and inspected it carefully.

"I feel fine." My voice sounded a little bit different. More... automatic, and slightly deeper.

"Do you think it worked?" Now, the gloved hands gripped the sides of my face, and I could see Lance's face on the other side of the glass inspecting my own face carefully.

"I dunno. We'd have to test it first." With a short hand motion, I swiped his hands off my face. "What about Kuro? Has he transferred yet?"

"Nearly; every few hours he transfers a bit more, but he's not quite at 100% yet... so says the machines."

"He's in another room, right?"

"Right. You may as well go back to sleep, as I won't be able to let you test the ability until later; I need to prep the dynamos."

"Alright, Lance. I'll be seeing you later."

"You too, Kuwaemasu-san." He gave a nod, a wave, and left the room into another room that looked like elevator. After the doors closed behind him, I could hear what sounded like a shower in the room he had just left to, and then another door opening and closing. Too bad Lance can't come in here without a hazmat suit. I ran a pale hand through my hair, whistled, and turned my head to look at my room. Despite living in it for a year, I could never get over it. It was basically the definition of 'causal messy futuristic'. There were gaps in the blue wall with blurry white stained glass that would pulse an aqua color every few seconds. Machinery of all sizes and shaped filled the room, several thick black wires, some split, hung from the wall, swaying constantly for a reason unknown to me. On my right side, was a row of 4 large transparent tubes, each one filled with differently colored liquids. From left to right, they were blue, green, red, and yellow, all hooked up to different machines but connected by the same wires in between them and on the tops of them. Along my left side was a metallic, gray dresser, a large wall mirror, and a large fish tank with an electric eel in it, with its own, thinner wires, which led into the wall. Right now, I was standing on a large circular platform that took up nearly half of the room, which had two layers. A foot in from the edge of the top layer was a small, centimeter-wide, 3-inch deep depression running a ring around the entire circle, and a small circle with a 2 foot diameter in the middle. Looking up, the ceiling, save for an identical 2-layered platform above previously-said platform, was a long, slightly distorted mirror. The only thing other than that was a mechanical door at the end of the room. Other than the door, there was no way to actually leave the room.

"Maybe I'll just go to sleep for awhile... Not really hungry, and I'll need all the power I can get if I'll need to test with the dynamos." I glanced upwards at the platform above my head, and moved over to the glowing spot in the middle of the platform.

"Enter sleep mode." My voice projected and racketed around the room, until I heard a robotic voice.

"Entering sleep mode." Each light slowly shut off as the circular platform above me opened and a large glass tube lowered, and yes, with several large tubes in its sides, only to settle into the depression mentioned earlier. A mask, similar to the one that had been on the oxygen tank 1 year ago, lowered down quickly, and I strapped it on as a a thick, hardly noticeable transparent, white, thick, margarine-like fluid came gushing from all the tubes. My senses were blinded as I slowly slipped into a state of unconsciousness and floated upwards.

 **2 Months Later**

"It worked, Kuwaemasu-san! It worked!" Lance, in an observatory room directly above me, exclaimed happily as the badly-mutilated, once-formidable demon fell before me, and the 12 bloodied dynamos returned to me, bouncing nonchalantly around my head.

"I can see that," was my dull reply, as the dynamos lowered a bit. They didn't look very complex on the outside. Only a foot long, the middle 3 inches was a black circular metallic block, and 2 spikes, glowing a dim purple, each 4.5 inches long, protruded from the flat sides. In the middle of the block was a small line, since the block actually wasn't just one piece, with a scythe-like design causing a slightly detour for the line.

"Don't be rude!" He exclaimed exasperatingly.

"Besides, we gotta pick up Kuro before we get on the road." I ignored his statement and made my way towards the exit, down the hall, took 2 right turns, up a flight of stairs, straight past 3 crossroads, a left turn, and went up another flight of stairs. It doesn't matter if I wait for Lance, since he'll just catch up. There are multiple routes to the same place; 'specially from where Lance was standing. Just as I swung open the door to the room Ukobach and Kuro were in, Lance entered through the door on my left.

"He's in the capsule over there." He pointed across the room to 2 capsules, paired together by, you guessed it, wires, that were entirely empty except for, from right to left, was Kuro and a floating diamond-shaped crystal, each in one of the two. Kuro looked like a pale, yellow, sparkly apparition that looked like the apparition of an apparition. The crystal, on the other hand, was illuminated from the inside, nearly 2 feet in diameter and 1 foot in length.

"He should be finished in just a few more minutes." Lance's voice suddenly spoke up from behind me. I just nodded.

"Okay. I won't be needing anything, will I?"

"Nothing but the clothes you're wearing, the backpack in the car, the eye patch I'll be giving you later, and foundation. You'll probably figure it out once we get there. The liquid, in case you were wondering, was like a super-charger. If you sleep as normal, you'll all regain energy anyway. The liquid just sped up the process." His nod was directed at the 12 dynamos turning slow somersaults and floating around, as though they were bored.

"Alright." I sat down as though there was a chair behind me, but instead, the dynamos suddenly rushed around me. I ended up sitting on 2, with my right elbow resting on one as my right hand supported my head, as my left arm rested on my knee with my legs crossed.

"Showoff." Lance grinned, and flipped a few switches on a nearby machine as the apparition disappeared. The capsule with the crystal slid open, shining brightly through the room.

"Go and take it, before it disappears." With a shrug, I stood up and walked to the crystal, the dynamos rolling through the air around my feet and shoulders. It didn't take me long to reach the crystal, and to hold it tight to my chest; I felt like something was merging into my very essence, almost my very soul. The aura felt vaguely like Kuro's, but I could not hear it make a sound. Seconds after, the feeling faded, but I still felt there was something added to my very being. The light slowly faded, so I let go. The item fell until it was about level with my knees. I took a few steps back, and the diamond-shaped crystal followed me, with a bobbing motion.

"It will follow you, no matter what. When you command it to open, it will become Kuro, until you command it to close again. Although, get me wrong. It's not an object pretending to me Kuro. It IS Kuro, just transferred into a different form."

I just nodded wordlessly. "Can we get a move on now?"

"Of course, of course." He grinned mischievously and led me through the complicated structure for nearly another 45 minutes, neither of us ever tiring, until we finally reached 2 swinging doors, and stepped out into the sunshine. I was incredibly aware of the bottom of my boots clicking against the pavement. I didn't need to look over my shoulder to know the entire thing was underneath a 'school building'. Holograms walked all around us, making it seem as though it was a real school. The doors and windows even opened with a hologram made a movement to open it, as though they were really doing it. However, once they made it about 5 feet into the building, they dissipated. Which is why any openings that allow somebody to see inside, for example a window, was tinted.

"Where's your car?" My eyes quickly searched the parking lot, while the dynamos, picking up on my sudden curiosity, became much more active. In a few moments, though, I saw the edge of it just around the corner, as though it was hiding.

"Oh. Never mind." Lance never said a word, but I could see the grin splayed on his face clearly. Rather than sit in the front, I strapped myself in the back seat.

"So, we're going back to True Cross Town." The crystal followed me into the car, and I made sure it made it inside before I shut the door, then reaching for the backpack on my left. It was rather plan... There weren't any 'exceptional' features to it; the backpack was colored a simple black, with 3 silver zippers. The only thing that might have been considered different about it was the fact that it took up the entire height, length, and width of the seat, and nearly the entire volume of that area.

"Yeah. Get the dynamos and Kuro in there when I say."

"Okay. We'll be there in... how long?"

"About 6 hours."

"I'll just sleep then."

"Alright. I'll wake you up an hour before we get there."

"Mhmm..." I barely heard what he said, and I found myself nodding off while the crystal bobbed near my right foot, hardly affected by the movement of the car. The dynamos rolled lazily across my vision, to which I would assume that it was my lack of thought process or sleepiness. Before I knew it, I had lapsed into a dreamless sleep; I hadn't had a dream since the night before I faked my death, just a year ago. It turned out that Lance already had all the 'equipment' ready to go, so all we really had to do was 'put it in place' and test it.

"Kuwaemasu-san! Wake up!" Said-prepared-person's yelling brought me back into a state of consciousness.

"We're about 45 minutes away. Decided ta' let you sleep a bit longer." Looking around, I noticed that we were on a bridge. The sky had darkened, but the light from the lamp posts stationed made it so I could only see a few dimmed stars.

"Thanks..." I felt groggy, but it didn't take long to wake up.

"You should probably put the dynamos and Kuro in the backpack. We're about to pass the first barrier, and the backpack has an anti-barrier spell on it that will prevent any alert." Lance sounded a bit antsy, so I simply listened. The zipper on the backpack was unexpectedly warm, as though someone had been holding it tightly for an extensive period of time.

"Put Kuro in the third one and dynamos in the second."

"...Mhmm." As soon as I opened the third one, the crystal seemed excited, went in my face, and settled inside the backpack, so I closed it. However, when I opened the second one, the dynamos continued to drift around my head lazily, since I wasn't feeling very active, I would guess.

"Command them." Lance said with a humorous tone, probably finding my lack of knowledge on how to control dynamos, mentally, mind you, funny. I cleared my mind and focused on the dynamos, unintentionally closing my eyes. I thought about the dynamos going inside the backpack, when I saw a blurry image of myself, the angle seeming to be from one of the dynamos. The 'screen' multiplied to 12, and I found myself controlling them and myself at the same time. It's strange to see yourself move, while controlling yourself at the same time, from a third person view. All the dynamos rushed into the backpack, and nestled in the dark space. Snapping back into first person, I closed the second pocket.

"The first one is for the schoolbooks, right?"

"Yeah." I felt like I was passing through a thin wall, but the sensation was only momentary.

"That was only the first barrier." Lance said, as though reading my mind.

"There are multiple barriers, each meant to keep out a certain level of demons."

"So it's like... several filters to minimize the strain on the final barrier to decrease the chances of it breaking?"

"Just about." Looking forward, I could already see it in the distance.

True Cross Town.

"Why can't you just train me? I'm sure they'd qualify me as an exorcist if an exorcist trained me within the Vatican's knowledge."

"I would only be able to up to the level of exwire, but in order to qualify for the Exorcist Exam, you would need to attend a cram school for at least a full year."

"Can't I go to a different cram school?"

"There's only one per country."

"That's... pretty stupid."

"I didn't make the rules. I'm pretty sure it's for protection reasons." I felt myself phase through an invisible thicker wall.

"How come Mephisto can't lower the barriers?"

"Because he doesn't know your a demon, much less that you're coming. I couldn't remove your powers, either, remember? All Mephisto knows is that I reserved a spot for a Kuwaemasu-san at the day school and cram school, when summer vacation ends in a week. Oh, but you won't have to start at page again. I told him that you had prior training."

"Alright... that makes enough sense. But why normal school?" The third barrier passed by, more quickly after the second than the second had the first.

"It's part of your cover-up. Just stick to it, and the next year will pass you by in a snap."

"Fine. But what about the other 2 years of high school? It'll be weird if I just drop out, and they won't actually let me take it until after high school."

"Yeah... I knew you'd figure it out eventually. So really, you'll be there for 2 years." His face grew solemn.

"Brace yourself."

"Huh?" I suddenly felt like I was being thrown through multiple steel walls, each more powerful than the last with short breaks in between. The car had slowed down significantly, despite Lance having slammed his foot on the gas pedal.

"Are... you sure... we'll make... it through...?" I rasped out. The power of the barrier was crushing my chest, but we were still moving.

"You're only part demon, so you'll still be able to get through. Just hang in there, this is the final barrier." Another full nearly breathless minute passed, when the car suddenly sped up and air filled my lungs. Luckily, the street was practically empty and it was the middle of the night, so nobody saw, though Lance had to stop the car completely before we kept going. True Cross Town, now much closer, loomed threateningly over our heads, yet I failed to be afraid and/or care.

"Like I said, that was the last one. From here on out, it's a straight, barrier-less path."

"Okay." I found myself yawning and leaning on the door.

"Feel free to sleep for the rest of the time." There was no time to respond before my vision went black for the second time during this drive.

My eyelids felt warm, and I began to see red. When I opened my eyes, I found a very homey room, colored with natural and earth colors, like the tan-ish peach walls and the earthy brown floor. The light source had been a window with two panes on my left, each pane being the size of two horizontal clipboards on top of each other, divided by a white plastic that proceeded to frame the entire window, only stopping at the sill. A white, veil-like curtain flowed gently from a bar at the top of the window.

"When did I get here?" I sat up, to feel something fluffy between my fingers. Then, I realized I was on a bed, and the fluffy thing had been a pale green blanket. The bed was more a square-shape, and back-to-back with the wall, between two bookshelves. Only now, I noticed a mirror in the corner of the room.

"When was the last time I looked in a mirror?" Was the first thing to cross my mind. Despite there nearly always being a mirror handy, I never bothered to actually look in one. With great hesitation, I brought myself to go over the mirror and look at its reflective surface, only to be pleasantly surprised with my new appearance.

"Not bad. Not bad at all."

My eyes were a slightly darkened shade of violet, but my left eye was glowing dimly. There was a crooked line running from my now-white hair, through my left eye, and down the side of my face, glowing the same color as my eye. A dark purple line ran along my eyelids, around both eyes. On my neck was a small collar with 2, black, thick threads almost like a rope tied to one circular block each, both having a different symbol painted on it. With an attempted flick at the collar, I realized it was 'attached'.

Over my torso was a t-shirt, colored so darkly purple it almost seemed black, with a third emblem hanging off the middle of the collar, which was again, unique to the other two. Over the shirt was white jacket with the sleeves folded up to right under my elbows, and stitched to stay there, dark purple lines painted over it in multiple places. At the crest of the hood was an intriguing pattern that almost looked like a scythe, but it was as though the blade had been pulled so it was like a 3/4 circle, with a little 7/8 circle surrounding the part of the line that went through the outer circle, under two cat ears stitched right above and to the side of the top of the bar in the pattern.

On my legs, I wore a pair of pants so dark a shade I could hardly tell if it was blue or black, with a metal chain hanging off where I would usually place the belt, consisting of multiple diamond-shaped pieces of metal, the last piece being a half-diamond attached to a spike. It hung down so low, it almost seemed like a tail. But that's not my tail, my tail was actually down my pants. Lance said he couldn't remove it without basically killing me. Didn't matter though; to be honest, I thought it looked great. The pants were tucked into knee-high, metal, black boots with depressions making patterns all over them, occasionally flickering a dim purple. The only other thing were two, thin, white, shiny, satin, finger-less gloves with little gold chains running around the wrist of each hand.

"Not bad at all." I repeated my previous statement, liking the new look very much. I flipped on the hood, admiring the fine craftsmanship, not caring that it was made with a 3D printer. Previously said tail shuffled in my shirt, but when it brushed against my back, I felt uncomfortable.

"Oh, yeah. Something about... yeah." Lance's words came back to me. Something about contractible, metal, working wings. Then, I remembered something else.

"Where is Lance, anyway?" So I decided to leave the room and look for him.

"Lance? Are you here?" My new voice didn't echo, much to my surprise.

"...Are you alive?" My paler-than-before-I-faked-my-death arms fell limply to my sides as I groaned in annoyance with Lance. Then, there was a dulled scratching noise headed towards me, from behind, followed by the crashing noises I'd grown tired of long ago. Yet, I didn't feel threatened. Especially when my backpack 'magically' went through a wall behind me and semi-floated over to me, part of it dragging behind the elevated part. It continued towards me until it stopped by my shins and floated, much as Kuro had done.

"Kuro, sleep." The backpack immediately stopped floating and remained motionless on the floor.

"Find Lance." The backpack suddenly took off down the hall, several bulges forming, which I could tell was the dynamos pushing around. While I waited, I decided to go find a kitchen and eat, narrowly avoiding a bouncing backpack zooming past my face, before remaining in the air, 5, 6, or 7 bulges on both sides of the backpack, at a crossroads in the hall, apparently fighting over which way to go.

"Go right." The bulges on the left side disappeared, and more bulges appeared on the right side almost as immediately, causing the backpack to go flying into the floor, seemingly bounce off, and go through another wall.

"Good morning Kuwaemasu-san. How did you sleep?"

"WAAH!"

Needless to say, there were more holes in the house left by the dynamos after that.

* * *

 **So happy these are getting longer. Feel like I've come so far. Hope there's no errors, despite that I proofread it... I need a beta. Volunteers? Anybody?**

 **PLEASE REVIEW! Like I said before... I TAKE CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM!**


	3. First Day

~Kuwaemasu's POV~

I spent most of the following week sitting on Lance's doorstep. Everything was exactly as I had remembered it, even the Academy from before. It seemed as though nothing had changed. As though this was just a dream, that Rin was still going to school there, that everything was the way it was before. The only thing is, it's not.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure what I'll find when I go back today. I'm supposed to be leaving to catch the bus to the Academy in a few minutes, but I can't really bring myself to go get the backpack. One of those, 'Just a few more minutes' things.

"Kuwaemasu-san, it's time to go to school." Lance now stood in the doorway, holding a jerking backpack in one hand, which looked heavier than before.

"First day back to school. You'd better not be late."

"Don't I have to move into a dorm?"

"Not until tomorrow." He thrust the backpack into my hand.

"There's a lunch bag in your backpack. The eye patch and the powders are in there, too. Now, hurry up, or you'll miss the bus!"

"Alright, alright!" I ran off, slipping the backpack sleeves over my shoulder.

"Don't forget to put them on at school!" Lance yelled in the distance, and I face palmed, wishing I'd done it at home. All I could do was clamp my left hand over the left side of my face as I reached the bus stop. I was pretending that I had a headache, but the way this morning started out, I really was starting to get a headache. Luckily enough, the bus didn't take too long in its coming, but it certainly took its sweet time in going to the Academy.

"Can't this dumb thing go any faster?" I muttered under my breath, left hand still on my face, despite that the bus was nearly empty and I was the only person sitting in this aisle. After what felt like an eternity, the bus finally pulled up in front of the gates to the Academy, and with a quiet thanks to the higher powers, I passed through its gates. Multitudes of students swarmed the campus, and I could hardly see one foot on front of me before I saw someone else.

"All I can do and hope it won't be a long day..." Lance's last few words before I left for school suddenly shoved their way to the front of my mind.

"Oh, shit... I need to find a bathroom..." It's unbelievably hard to keep your balance with a heavy backpack on your shoulders across a swarmed campus full of shoving students, with me occasionally shoving somebody else. Multiple times, I heard cursing behind me, and the occasional smell of blood from scrapes. When I made it inside, the crowd thinned considerable, giving me an easy oath to the bathroom, which I made quick use of. Once I entered the bathroom, I slammed the door with my side, went over to the mirror, rested the backpack on the floor, and finally took the hand away from my face.

Still glowing as before, and still as purple as before.

It only took a few seconds of searching the backpack to find the items I needed. A linen eye patch, a bottle of cream the same color as my skin, a compact lid with powder the same color as my skin, and a second compact lid the same color as my skin. The first lid had a much larger, stuck-out brush, but the second one had a more concentrated brush. After several minutes of laying the foundation thickly over the line, then generously applying the contents of the second lid over where the line was, though I couldn't see it anymore, and generously applying the final layer. After all that was done, I put the eye patch on and turned it so it completely hid my left eye. It only took me a few minutes to put the two powders, but not the foundation, around my eye, in order to hide the rings.

I took a step back, and took a look at myself. Other than the strangely colored eye, the white hair, and the eye patch, I looked like a normal Academy student. The uniform didn't look bad on me.

"Meh... uniform is the same as I remember, too," was my off-handed comment, directed at the dark jacket, with white trims, buttoned shut, the darkly colored pants, the dress shoes, and the red, black, and white tie dangling limply across my chest. I wasn't allowed to unbutton the shirt, considering that I wasn't wearing the school blouse underneath, but instead, the purple shirt I've been using for a long time now.

"Not terrible, but not great." I adjusted the eye patch a bit, slid my arms back through the sleeves, and walked away, hoping that the books wouldn't crush the dynamos, but my hope was realized and gifted when I felt the dynamos move. They felt like a part of me, and I could feel every movement they made.

"Too bad Lance didn't install a sleep mode on you guys," I said and sighed at the same time, hoping the dynamos wouldn't be a problem during school.

Before I knew it, I was sitting in class. Time flew by faster than expected, lunch came and went, afternoon classes were a snap, and then came cram school. Takara was nowhere to be seen, Shiemi's hair had gotten longer, Konekomaru had become taller, but the others hadn't changed very noticeably. Yukio was still teaching the first cram school class of the day. As soon as I walked in, he gestured for me to come over to his desk, so I did, and stood there for about 10 minutes as everyone settled in, and the door was closed. Once the door closed, everybody fell silent and Yukio began to speak.

"Hello, class. I am Okumura Yukio. I am aware most of you know this, but seeing as we have a new student this year, it is only appropriate." He paused to clear his through. "His name is..." Yukio paused momentaryly, squinting at the name written on the index card on his desk, which went unnoticed by nearly everybody else, "Torēsā(1) Kuwaemasu." He looked at me, unpleasantly surprised. All I did was adjust my eye patch a little bit, once again... Everybody else gave me strange looks at the odd name... that wasn't really a name... I could understand why Yukio was upset with the name... after all, he'd hear Lance call Rin 'Kuwaemasu-san' before. It was a long time ago, but I'm honestly sure that he remembers. His attention quickly turned back to facing the rest of the class.

"Take a seat anywhere you please. As you can see, there are many available." I simply nodded and looked around. I'd always heard that lacking an eye usually results in depth perception, but now, I'm extremely lacking in depth perception, with the lack of sight from my left eye. With the occasional use my hand and a bulge emerging from my backpack and pressing on my back, I made it - safely - to a spot two desks behind Izumo.

"Kuwaemasu? What kind of name is that?" Bon snickered to my left. I simply shook my head and ran my hand through my hair as Yukio began the lesson on Demonology. Other than the occasional note, I was sitting motionless with my head resting in my left hand.

"And so, a demon's invisibility may be countered with the recitation of Psalm 140:5(2). Are you getting all this?" A few 'yeah's chorused from the class, but mine was a bit delayed as I checked my 'page' of notes to make sure the reference was written down. My notes hardly took up half the page, as I only wrote the bare meanings and notes, for example, 'invisibility - Psalm 140:5'.

"Good. Moving on..." Yukio then began to talk about how to counter a demon that doesn't have a physical form. The rest of the class was spent in silence, save for the chalk scraping against the board and Yukio's voice. I couldn't hear any whispers, but I would glance around on occasion, and sometimes catch one of my classmates looking at me with a negative expression. Bon's, however, was the only one that had any anger in it. It was only slightly angry, though, that either he was masking his anger or was only a little bit angry for real... but knowing Bon, I'm pretty sure it's the first one. Even with a glance at Izumo, who momentarily glanced at me as well, had a more negative expression than usual.

While I wondered what had everybody so down, my backpack, which I had placed under the desk, tried to move around, so I firmly place my foot on it. Thankfully, it was only a quiet thud and nobody seemed to notice. Unluckily, the backpack jerked again.

'Please stay still...' I thought desperately, and much to my joy, the backpack settled into a still state.

"So as you can see, a demon without a solid form may be trapped with a furutsubaki-no-rei(3), while said plant may easily be forced to dispose of the soul by injecting diluted holy water directly into the central vein of any leaf. Any questions?" My hand moved to write what was just written on the board, while Izumo raised her hand.

"Kamiki-san?"

"How would you safely inject the holy water into the leaf without it noticing you or doing the same thing to you?"

"They enter a paralyzed state when exposed to bright lights. Should you have no source of light, then plucking one of its leaves will also paralyze it, but only for a few minutes." To this, Izumo nodded, and wrote it down. I decided to write it down as well, seeing as the information was incredibly useful. A loud ringing noise made its way into the room, and I barely stopped myself from clamping my hands over my ears in time.

"Class dismissed. Torēsā-san, please stay after class. Don't worry, I'll write a note for your next teacher to excuse you for being late." I just nodded again, and he began to read something on his desk, while I watched everybody slowly file out of the classroom, to head to gym. Konekomaru, being the last out, closed the door behind him. We both sat in silence for a few minutes, before he finally spoke.

"Sir Pheles asked me to give you a map of the cram school and a schedule for your classes," he held up two papers, "and to ask if you would like some tutoring, in case you feel like you're behind the rest of the class. Would you like to be tutored?"

"Thank you for your consideration, and tell Sir Pheles I said thank you to him as well, but I don't feel I require any tutoring." I stood up, put the backpack on, and went over to take the two papers that were still in his hand.

"Thank you both for the map and schedule, too."

"Here's the note." He handed me a sticky-note with a message scribbled neatly on it.

"Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow."

"You as well." With that, I left the room, and as I walked towards the gym room, I held both papers in my hands and tore them up repeatedly, until eventually tossing them into a trashcan outside of the room. Mr. Tsubaki was teaching gym this year, and he was just saying how the exercises were going to be the same as always, which I would assume to be like the year I was here, as well.

"Today I will have two students go down into the pit at a time, and have them work on their endurance as they are chased around by the reapers." He sounded more... monotone than usual.

"The first two students who will go down into the pit are... Ryuji and Torēsā. Torēsā-san, would you go change into your gym uniform now?" I nodded wordlessly yet again, accepted the uniform handed to me, and walked into the gym bathroom to change. When I walked out, I was still wearing the purple shirt underneath the gym shirt, mesh knee shorts, and sneakers. The emblems, which were tucked underneath the jacket before, now bounced freely against my chest as I walked back over to the rest of the class, but didn't remove my gloves. Before going to the group, though, I detoured to my back and made it sure it was a good distance away from the group, then going back there.

"Alright. If you will both step into-" My feet had carried me away from the group before he finished talked, to the edge of the pit, then to slide down to the bottom and wait as Bon huffed and took the ladder. Soon enough, we were running circles in the pit, being chased 'round and 'round by the reaper, with my partner sending the occasional glance my way, until he tripped, and the reaper was about to jump onto him. I found myself standing in front of the reaper, staring it in the eyes.

"Fuck off." My voice sounded like it was laced with venom. A purple light overtook the darkness my left eye saw, and I felt the corners of my mouth twitch upwards as the reaper squealed and skidded on its feet as it tried to get away from me as quickly as possible. The light dimmed and my left eye was left in the darkness of the eye patch once again.

'Stay still.' My backpack, which had been creeping to the edge of the pit, unnoticed by anybody, stopped moving. Good thing I'd managed to stop the reaper... Tsubaki hadn't figured out with of the levers attached to that particular reaper's 'collar' before I could do what I did. Bon stared at me in surprise, probably because I had done the same thing when I was Rin. I hadn't used such coarse language, but it was kind of the same situation. All I could do was stare back at him with my one eye that wasn't enveloped in darkness.

"Watch yourself. If you trip during the real thing, you might not live to see the light of the following day." With that, I bent over, gripped his hand, pulled him to his feet, went over to the ladder, and climbed out of the pit as Tsubaki rushed over, Bon following me.

"Are you boys alright?!" Tsubaki did a quick pat-down of both of us.

"I'm fine. Not sure about this person here, whose about as twinkle-toed as a three-legged elephant." I hissed under my breath.

"Watch it." Bon growled at me.

"Both of you, silence. You didn't run for the full time, so you need to go back down there. Ryuji, be careful not to trip again." Both of us re-entered the pit and resumed our run, now using a different, younger reaper. I could've sworn I heard Tsubaki whisper,

"It's just like what I was told what happened in with Ryuji and Okumura in the first year..." but I ignored it.

"What's your problem?" Bon finally growled at me as the reaper landed right behind us, but before it could jump again, we managed to get far enough away from it to keep it from landing behind us again.

"I could say the same thing. I've hardly known you for 3 hours, and yet you've been looking at me with anger the whole time. Care to explain?"

"Care to explain the insult?"

"You tripped while running away from something that could potentially kill you, if it wasn't leashed, or if you were down here by yourself, or even if you were out in the real world. I..." I sighed, before continuing to speak.

"I shouldn't have said that. What I meant was... you should be more careful. You could be gravely injured with slip-ups like that."

"...Oh."

"So... why do you keep looking at me with anger?"

"Well... it's a personal matter..."

"I've only known you for three..." The reaper landed behind us again, causing us to lift a few inches off the ground from the force of its landing, barely giving us enough time to escape it, so we both sped up a little bit to try and put some distance between us and the reaper.

"For three hours. What would I have to do with it?"

"It was... a friend's death, a year ago. He was part of the cram school, too. His spot at the school's been unoccupied since he died, and now you're occupying it..." It couldn't be my faked death, could it? No... impossible. They didn't particularly like me.

"So it feels like I've taken his place." I finished the sentence for him.

"Well... yeah."

"I'm sorry if it feels that way. If it helps any, I can request private cram school lessons, so you don't have to see me."

"No, it's fine. I'm sorry my behavior; it was out of line." Is it just me, or is Bon being more mild than I remembered?

"It's fine... so, what's your name?"

"Ryuji Suguro... And I already know yours... Torēsā Kuwaemasu." He smirked a bit, and we both slowed down, as we were almost took far from the reaper for it to take interest in us.

"Right. Who are the others?"

"Well... the pink-haired one is Shima Renzou; watch out for him if you don't like pervs... and don't introduce any girls to him. The one with red glasses is Miwa Konekomaru. He's pretty mild-mannered, and a smart student as well. He, Shima, and I all grew up together, so you'll often see us as a trio."

"Okay... what about the girls?"

"The one with the purple-hair is Kamiki Izumo. She has one of the highest scores in the class, but she's pretty mean at times. Other times, she'll usually be ignoring you or scoffing at you. As for the blonde, her name is Moriyama Shiemi. She doesn't have a bad bone in her body, and her mother runs the Exorcist Supply Shop."

"I'll have to remember that. What meisters are all you guys aiming for?"

"Well, I'm going for Dragoon and Aria, Shima is going for Knight, and Konekomaru wants to be an Aria. As for Izumo and Shiemi, Izumo aims for Tamer, and more recently Dragoon, while Shiemi is trying to become a Tamer and a Doctor. What about you? Which meister are you aiming for?"

"In the most technical terms, Dragoon and Knight."

"Technical terms?"

"Don't read too much into it. It's not that complicated, it's just that it's not necessarily a gun and sword, but a more custom weapon is all."

"Oh, well, that's alright. Shima uses a rod instead of a sword."

"Ah. Well, I think we should speed up. The reaper is really starting to gain on us."

"...I think that's a good idea, too."

After a few more classes of cram school, I found myself sitting at a bus stop, waiting for my bus, which would come in about 15 minutes. The sunshine was shining warmly on my face, and my backpack was draped limply over my lap. I wonder which dorm I'll be placed in? Lance said he would request the abandoned one, and tell Mephisto it was so I could train without anybody else getting into the 'line of fire', but I don't think the request will be accepted, considering there's a training room in the cram school. Then again, it's only accessible during cram school training hours, which is the two hours directly at the end of the last cram school class of the day. It didn't particularly matter, but at the same time, it did. I needed somewhere I could train with the dynamos safely.

"I wonder what the others are up to. Probably going around their normal lives..." Since I arrived at the Academy, I couldn't stop thinking about how their lives were after I left. Probably more carefree and worry-free. I just can't help but wonder if they were affected in a negative away, especially the way Tsubaki, Bon, and Yukio spoke, and from everyone else's expressions...

It's... strange.

* * *

 **(1) Japanese for 'Tracer' Once again, Elsword reference.**

 **(2) Psalm 140:5 (NIV [New International Version]) "** **Proud men have hidden a snare for me; they have spread out the cords of their net and have set traps for me along my path."**

 **(3) A soul-sucking plant of Japanese mythology. Bit custom, but the name is from lore.**

 **Is it just me, or is it that whenever you really ask people to review, that one chapter usually doesn't get any? I've seen it with multiple stories... so confusing... Whatever... Baiii**

 **Das vedania!**

 **So satisfied with the length of the chapters now. So very very satisfied.**


	4. West Boys Dormitory

**Teacher Meeting**

~Kuwaemasu's POV~

"And this," Lance shoved me towards the purple-haired principal, as the other teachers were discussing things among themselves, "is Torēsā-san, the new student and the minor that I am in charge of. Torēsā-san, say hello."

A "...Hello," formed itself in my mouth and released as I bowed at the same time. After this, I found myself glancing at my reflection in the window. White and baby blue tailcoat with golden buckles. White dress pants with blue and gold intertwining patterns near the side of my foot. Baby blue dress shoes. White blouse and blue scruff. A white eye patch, instead of the gloomily-colored one I had worn in school. Golden stud earrings with tiny diamonds in the 4 clutches on the diagonal edges on each earring. Baby blue finger-less covers over the satin gloves with golden scruffs at the base and a sapphire at the middle of the covers. The final addition had been 2 sapphire bracelets on each wrist. I understood that I needed to look... PRESENTABLE... but this was a bit too far, in my opinion. I mean, I know WHY, but I don't quite get why, if you know what I mean. Lance's conversation with Mephisto finally came back into focus with my ears.

"So as you can see, I would like to be the assistant fighting instructor of the cram school. After all, you know my occupations for the Vatican require me to be skilled with a variety of weapons." Mephisto seemed to be seriously considering this.

"I don't see why not." He finally spoke, grinning.

"You start tomorrow."

"Alright." Lance bowed appreciatively.

"Torēsā-san, say goodbye to Mr. Faust."

"Osaki ni shitsurei shimasu(1), Mr. Faust," I said with a bow.

"Osaki ni shitsueri shimasu, Mr. Faust." Lance said the same thing, and gestured for me to follow him out the door. I simply nodded and followed him, happy to be able to take off this outfit that looked a lot like Mephisto's.

"Ki wo tsukete(2), Torēsā-san, Mr. Clarke," came Mephisto's voice from behind us. As soon as Lance closed the door behind him, he fist-pumped as he headed towards the elevator.

"So now you'll be the instructor for the last class of cram school?"

"Yep!" He seemed overexcited about it.

"You seem pretty excited about this."

"Yeah... I used to teach the cram school a long time ago, but I retired to take up other occupations. I guess I'm just glad to be back."

"Glad to be back." I echoed solemnly.

"Is something wrong, Kuwaemasu-san?"

"Nothing... it's nothing." Lance had then studied my facial expression the entire way down in the elevator and out to the car.

"Well, whatever you say. I can't really force you to tell me, anyway." Both of us sat down in the front seats of the car as Lance began to pull away from the school grounds, back to Lance's house, in the slightly illuminated, first few rays of moonlight.

"You'll have to pack up your stuff for moving tomorrow. Even though your dorm hasn't been decided yet, you'll definitely be moving into one."

"I figured as much."

"Stop being a smart-aleck and go start packing." Despite the rude choice of words, Lance was chuckling about it as he entered the apartment. I found myself shrugging out of habit and entering after him, to go straight into the room I had claimed as my own, being the one I had woken up in a week ago, and toss a few items into my backpack. A hand mirror, the powders, the darkly colored eye patch, the green blanket, and a few books were among the items. The dynamos shuffled, and it gave me the same uncomfortable feeling that I felt when somebody would, say, brush the hairs on my tail in a different direction of its natural growth pattern. The same uncomfortable feeling in my spine.

"Fine, but don't bother Lance..." I mumbled as I opened I pulled on the second zipper. As soon as I did, the dynamos shoved their way out and began to float around the room, which dispelled the feeling in my spine and made me feel at ease. After a few minutes, I went over a mental checklist in my head of what I would need.

"Oh! I should probably go get the key of vanishment and Kurikara before I go. If I am correct... Lance has it." My gaze traveled to one dynamo that had accidentally bumped into the back of my head.

"Make sure not to let the others out." I told the object firmly, and it quickly moved towards the door, pushing away any dynamos that came near as I left. I came back about 10 minutes later with a key dangling from a looped string in one hand and the sleeve in which Kurikara was held with the other hand. To my delight, the one dynamo I had tasked was still fiercely guarding the door.

"Alright... one... two... three, four... five... six, seven, eight... nine, ten... eleven, and..." I turned my head quickly in search of the final one, to see that it was right behind me.

"Twelve." The Kurikara was then attached to the back of my backpack with a little clip, the key of vanishment was wrapped tightly around my wrist, and the backpack bounced carelessly against my, well, back, as I left the room and went downstairs to the living room, nearly forgetting the dynamos.

"Follow me." As soon as I said that, the dynamos lined up behind me, 6 on each side, in a neat pattern, each and every one in the same position, never leaving their place... which was a bit worrisome, considering their usual constant movement. I'd except them to at least be in different positions, but they were exactly the same. Finally, I reached the living room, where Lance was laughing at some comedy show.

"Lance, I'm packed up." He looked over to see what I had brought, but the only thing I had brought was an even-heavier-than-before backpack and the dynamos floating behind me.

"That's all your bringing? Not even a poster or two? You know, you can customize your side of the room a bit."

"Don't really see the point, considering that at the end of the year, should we not stay for the summer, I'll have to undo everything," was my incredibly monotone reply.

"Don't be so stuffy, Kuwaemasu-san. It's just an expression of yourself."

"If I'm paired with someone else, I don't think they would really want to see an expression of myself, seeing as I even took your offer for this, over a year ago."

"You make a point there. Well, just leave your backpack in the corner there," he gestured lazily to the meeting place of wall and table-that-the-TV-was-on, "and go do... something. If anything, sleep."

"Mhmm." My feet carried me back outside, into an alleyway, up a fire escape, across a few rooftops, and to a standstill at the bright, buzzing, lively city below me. Several stores were still open, despite it being so late at night, cars were zooming past people on the sidewalks, some walking pets, some holding bags, and some even seemingly just coming home from work with their briefcases.

"You truly can find almost anything at True Cross Town. Whether it be demons and exorcists or toy stores and amusement parks." My voice sounded more dull than normal.

"You can even find broken hearts." The memory was vivid. I wasn't in the classroom, but the memory was vivid. Yukio with his gun pointed at me. Hobgoblins appearing everywhere.

 _"You killed father!"_ His pained and angry voice resounded in my skull. How just awhile later, he barged into the dormitory they we forced to share. A dormitory I would share with someone who could potentially be my end, when I needed to live in order to fulfill his ambition. How he, oh so easily, took up the position of prison guard over brother. I have to wonder what Yukio thought of me, when he was 7 and found out about... everything.

"Probably not very highly," my bitter-sounding voice said. I didn't remember feeling upset about this... I mean, at first, I was obviously put down by him, only to be put down again later, but I'd gotten over it in the past year, with Lance constantly looking out for me. Lance had been looking out for me for awhile before we left for his 'place', but this was a different feeling. They sounded so sad, during their testimonies. Did I leave behind positive memories, or negative memories? Did I leave both? Did I leave more of one and less of the other, or was it balanced out?

"...Doubt I'll ever find out..." I found myself laughing, as the dazzling lights below left spots in my eyes whenever I looked for too long. Maybe I'm a little masochist? I dunno. It's not like I was forced to have it all implanted in me. Dynamo chips, orbs, cores, wires... all the necessary circuitry is running under my flesh. I agreed to it willingly, but I don't think that necessarily makes me masochist. I agreed in order to become an Exorcist. I knew I was a nearly-helpless case. When I met Lance and he began to tell me about his line of work, I saw my opportunity and volunteered. I don't think it makes me masochist; I think it makes me highly determined.

"Might as well call it a night." A sigh escaped my lips as I tracked my way back to the roof of the apartment building, and made my way down the fire escape until I was on the floor Lance and I had been on, after which I spent about 4 minutes moving sideways along an wall, using the window frames, with the occasional help of a dynamo or two. It's amazing what people don't see, just because it's happening above their heads. Eventually, I reached the window I'd woken up in the light from and slipped in. Before I knew it, I was asleep on the bed, not even having bothered to change out of the clown clothes.

The next morning, I awoke to multiple dynamos poking at my legs, back and arms, and for a moment I could've sworn I heard them saying 'Get up! You're moving into a dorm today!'. It was rather annoying but it stopped almost as quickly as it had started, but, when I realized I was still wearing the clown outfit, I darted into the bathroom, changed, stuffed the dynamos into the backpack, and was off to school with a wave-off from Lance. Right before I charged into the school and was about to enter the classroom where the first morning class took place when I was pulled aside by a teacher.

"Torēsā-san, may I speak to you for a moment, about your sleeping arrangements?"

"Of course, Kawaguchi(3)-sensei."

"It's been decided that you shall be sharing a room with a Konekomaru Miwa, who currently resides in the West Boy's Dormitories, room 283. Now, run along to class."

"Yes, Kawaguchi-sensei." I bowed and entered my morning class, wondering how I would fare in bunking with one of my old friends.

And so, after a long day of studies, I was taking my time in walking across the campus to the West Boy's Dorms. Konekomaru, catching sight of me, tried to catch up to me.

"Hey, Torēsā-san, I heard the news!" He eventually caught up to me and walked at my side.

"Yeah." I nodded, eyes fixed on the slowly-growing building. The rest of the walk was spent in silence, but once we entered the dorm, I slowed down a bit to allow myself to trail behind Konekomaru up to the room. Half of the side was filled with books, utensils, but at the same time was neat. The other half was bare. Nothing but the mattress. I silently placed my backpack on the desk and removed all the books and placing them on the table. The next half hour was spent hanging up my clothes, placing the blanket on the bed, discreetly putting the powders into the desk drawer, etc., etc. When I was done, it still looked rather bare. Konekomaru had been studying during this, occasionally looking up at me. When I finished, I opened my math textbook, and we both just sat in silence for a bit as we worked on homework and studying. Even though I wouldn't admit this to anybody, I rather enjoyed the silent company.

I heard running. It was getting close the door. Talking. The dynamos start twitching and it was making me feel restless. My tail thumped quietly against my back, but other than that, did not move at all. I immediately relaxed when Shima and Suguro burst into the room, though.

"Hey Konekomaru, what's up! ...Did you know that the new kid is in here?" He gave me a sideways glance. Suguro just smirked and watched the scene unfold.

"This morning, it was decided that we would share the room."

"Oh. Well, I'm Shima Renzou. Pleasure to meet'cha!" He walked over to me and held out his hand, expecting me to shake it. I stared at it for about 3 seconds before I actually did so.

"You already know my name." Was my nearly incoherent response as I went back to doing my homework.

"Are you obsessed with good grades too? These two are unbelievable." Shima groaned, and I almost smirked. Almost.

"Well, I do want good grades, but it's not the end of the world if I get a bad one. There's always next time." My more understandable-than-the-mumble response.

"So you're kinda in the middle?"

"I guess you could say that." I nodded and jotted down something in my notebook as I filled in another answer.

"...Could you tutor me?" He was suddenly up in my face, and I almost bolted for the door.

"What?"

"Suguro is too hard on me when I get something wrong, and Konekomaru works too quickly for me. I just thought that if somebody more in the middle was tutoring me, it would be more... I dunno, efficient?"

"...Uh, sure." I shrugged.

"So... what time do you think we should meet up?" Shima backed off a bit, but was practically breathing down my neck.

"What about Thursdays, from 5 to 7?"

"I can do that. Thanks! ...Can I have your number?"

"...Umm... sure... here..." I jotted the number quickly onto a piece of paper and handed it to him, then resuming my own work... Although, resuming wouldn't be the right word for it, seeing as I never stopped working in the first place. Konekomaru and Suguro watched the exchange silently.

"Later!" Shima bounded out of the room, apparently forgetting why he came in the first place, and Suguro could only walk away chuckling. The room fell back into silence for awhile, until Konekomaru closed his book and started talking.

"So... you're gonna be tutoring Shima now?"

"Yeah. I just thought it would help leave a good impression. Since I'm new, and all."

"That makes enough sense."

A couple of minutes passed, the only sounds being the occasional gust of wind, Konekomaru tapping the desk with his pen as he stared out the window at the clear blue sky, the scratching of the pencil on my paper, and sometimes the sharpener.

"You're so quiet during class, but during that exchange you were able to voice your opinions quickly. Do you have like... a school mode and home mode type of thing going?"

"Not really. I guess it just depends on whether or not I have something to say."

More silence, and then more talking.

"Do you have a lot of hobbies?"

"Depends on your perspective."

"Well, what are some of them?"

"Well, there's swordsmanship, archery, cooking... in my own perspective, there aren't very many, but that's just on point of view."

"Never took you to be a chef."

"I get that a lot."

"I can imagine." A playful grin splayed onto his features.

* * *

 **Sorry I didn't get to put this out last night. I wasn't paying attention to the time when I did the A/N of 'Remember', so very very sorry .**

 **Onto the definitions!**

(1) 'Excuse me for leaving first' A farewell typically spoken to your co-workers or boss when your leaving the workplace before they do.

(2) 'Take care' A farewell that may be used in multiple situations, including, but not limited to, when somebody is leaving your house or leaving for a holiday.

(3) A Japanese surname I just looked up quickly. It means 'mouth of the river'.

Sorry if I forget one! Please remind me in the reviews if you notice one, or even if there's this whole paragraph with terrible grammar or I'm just repeating the same sentence or something, and I will try to get around to re-updating it.

Das vedania!

I'm upset because it's so close to be 3000, but because it's not it feels so short. Also, I have 2 new story prologues and their first chapters set in my documents that I'm considering just to send out tomorrow before I even start working on a one-shot for the Blue Exorcist Parodies and One-Shots story.

So, one of them is called Lines, which is basically where Rin is a cutter, and the other is called Passed, where Rin becomes an angel, but the majority of the story takes place about a decade into the future. Sorry, but I love Rin. He's just so adorable! Yukio is too, but he can be a hard character to capture sometimes and figure out how he would react in certain situations, much less if he became an angel or was depressed or something.

You also get to pick the one-shot I'm posting tomorrow!

I'm debating between 2. One is called People Pleaser, the name speaking for itself if you know Rin is whom its based around, and another called iPod when Rin forgets his iPod in class and Suguro, wanting to see the stupid songs that are probably listed there, instead finds a bunch of dark and shadowy songs. No, not evil.

2/3 majority decides it, if nobody reviews then I'll leave it to an app.

Now, das vedania for realsies.

Das vedania!

I PASSED 3000 WORDS! YAY FOR BABBLING!


	5. Study Buddies

**OHMERGERD!**

 **Sorry I've been gone so long . I was busy with camp and my essay, and then I had to got to a sleep away camp for another week and then I tried to download some mods for minecraft but instead ended up with a bunch of retarded programs that just gave me a ton of viruses and prevented my Shockwave Flash plugin from working, therefore making me unable to access the internet, and stupid pop-ups AREN'T LETTING ME TRY TO WATCH ANIME! I managed to watch Tokyo Ghoul tho. Took a long time to watch it all, though, cuz' I had so little opportunity. I'm sorry, but it's a good anime. Anyway... Life hates me for making Rin fight printers and fake die and die for real and then come back to life and all that stuff I've been doing to him... Please enjoy the latest installment of Kuwaemasu while I just go over into this corner and cry dramatically while screaming something cliche.**

* * *

 **~The Following Week~**

~Kuwaemasu's POV~

"Konekomaru-san, wake up!" I hissed through my tight lips at my unconscious roommate, who was, surprisingly, a heavy sleeper. He's never slept this deeply before, though. I shook him a bit more. "Come on, it's time for school!" I silently hissed again, but this time in pain. My new tail and my old tail were poking each other in particularly sensitive spots, and I didn't really like it.

Then I had an idea. With almost no mental debate, I gripped my new tail by the base and gently pulled it out, and held it firmly by the diamond feeding into the spike. Then, I glanced at Konekomaru one more time, whispered a 'sorry', and jabbed him in the arm with the spike. My tail, out of surprise with the sudden touch of a person unfamiliar to it, escaped my grip and dove back into its hiding place.

The moment after, Konekomaru had woken up from the painful contact, and looked surprised. I didn't allow him to ask any questions though, just said a simple phrase:

"We're late for school."

His eyelids flew open, and after an extremely short period of time, he was running down the hall to the nearest bathroom with a basket full of stuff into the bathroom. I just sighed and stood up, adjusting the eye patch a bit. After wearing it a bit longer, I realized that the rough material it was made of was also itchy, and the strips that tied around the back of my head were rather weak and would droop. After school, I'll just go get a new one.

Konekomaru, who was now fully dressed and ready for school, save for his backpack and shoes, ran back into the room, panting, ditched the basket, grabbed his backpack, and called a "come on!" over his shoulder before running out of the room and putting on his shoes at the same time. I just grabbed my backpack on the way out and followed him.

The day was rather straightforward and predictable, besides the occasional break from the teacher's droning to remind us of an upcoming quiz or test, and a pop quiz in Biology. I had - literally - vanished when lunch started, but only to wolf down the pre-heated meal and reapply the makeup, which was difficult to do with several of the boy's bathrooms occupied. Eventually, I just settled with using the key of vanishment on the janitor's closet door and doing it in there. Turns out, the key of vanishment can be used to escape vanishment, too.

By the time all that had happened, it was time for afternoon classes, which were similar to the morning's classes, and then it was time for cram school again. Nothing important happened, but the back of my neck was going cold at the thought of Weapons Training, since Lance was going to be there. All hopes of him not showing up were dashed to pieces when we saw him standing next to Shura, who, rather than a hard glare or a casual pose with her fist on her hip, or even a small smirk, was just standing there with a blank frown. She'd even adapted to wearing blank capris with no designs on them like her shorts had, and rather than a bikini top was wearing a V-neck, dark purple, long-sleeved sweater. Her hair was down, as well, and she'd even dyed out the flamboyant yellow tips, straightened it, and cut off two inches. Her eyes held a dead look, maybe even grieving, look.

"Alrighty, I was told we have a new student joinin' us. Wha' meister are ye goin' fer, and what weapon is of your preference?" Even her voice had less than the usual spark to it.

"Actually, Shura-shi, Torēsā-san has a specialized and custom weapon, one which I actually created. I've purposely set up an area where he can use these, to avoid causing any accidents." Lance spoke up before I could. Shura just gave us both a strange look, shrugged, and waved us off, turning to the other students, one or two of which sent confused glances at me, but all sending hard glares at Lance, and sending them into different areas of the room, corresponding with their meister and weapon of choice. Once we were apart from the group, Lance firmly held my arm and led me out of the room and into another training room just a few rooms over than was identical to the last, save for it being much more dusty, and apparently, out of order.

"I pulled some strings with Mephisto, and got him to let us use this room." Lance clarified, locking the door. "Only you and I have access to it, unless you let someone else in, which, I advise against." He tossed a key to me, which I caught and linked it to the same chain the key of vanishment was on.

"Cool."

"You could sound a bit more excited, you know. No other student has ever gotten a private training room... Well, one that's this big and have unlimited access to it via key. Any other cases were tutoring and had to be let in by the teacher, and were often a smaller space due to the fact that hardly anybody requires the all of the room's utilities."

"To think that if I had said a longer sentence, I could have avoided that."

"Yes, you could have, but you didn't. Now, let Kuro and the dynamos out while I get some stuff. In foresight, I probably should have left the door unlocked." Lance sighed and looked for the key in his pocket.

"What other stuff?"

"Since the room was out of order, nobody ever cleaned it, or repaired it, or paid for this room's electricity, or anything like that, so a lot of these machines won't work. Until I can get all the dust of their systems and repaired and replaced the rusted and broken bits and stuff like that, we'll have to use dummies and dummies on remote-controlled race-cars."

"This'll be fun." I rolled my eyes, a smirk having crept onto my face moments earlier.

"It sure will!" He called, just as he closed the door behind him. As soon as he left, the smirk dropped into a frown and I unzipped the backpack, letting the dynamos and Kuro out, all of which seemed very happy at their 'new-found freedom'. They drifted around my lazily, while Kuro just stayed close to my shins. Since I had nothing to do at the current moment, I shut my eyes and let my thoughts drift, as well.

After a depressing thought chain, which left me feeling disgruntled and unnecessary, Lance still had not returned, so I decided to explore the room a bit. Just a bit. After wandering around a bit and ending up with extremely dusty hands, Lance finally made his return, and in his arms was a large cardboard box with rice-filled sacks, sticks, remote-controlled race-cars, markers, etc., etc.

"Help me set up!" He all but dropped the box on the floor and began separating the different objects. I just shrugged and patted my hands down on my pants before I joined him in the task. It didn't take very long; not longer than 10 minutes. There had been more items in there than I had anticipated.

"Hey, Lance?" I finally spoke at one point, while trying to remove my index finger from its plastic and rubber prison in a toy car, between the wheel and the engine. "Yeah?" He didn't bother to look up as he tossed another set of markers into the accumulating pile to our left. "Earlier, you told Shura-sensei that you had already set up the room and everything. It'd be nice if you could stop lying about that kind of thing for once." "Well, this is a team effort. I got the room, so you probably should be helping me set it up. I wasn't going to do it all by myself, you know, after making a lot of sacrifices for you."

A short pause.

"That's true, but couldn't you have at least done some of it, so I could do my share now and we'd be over and done with it faster?" "You do make a good point, but I am incapable of going back in time to change my decision, so, now we pay the consequence. It's not that much, anyway."

I finally pulled my finger free from the wheel-and-engine's clutches, however ending up with a tiny nick on my finger. I wasn't alarmed; it was just that I could see the circuitry inside my finger through the injury. It was mutely beeping. I could only see it just a tiny bit, but it was still a painful reminder of why I had decided to leave in the first place. Lance caught me zoning out and his pestering quickly brought me back to reality. "Hey, Kuwaemasu-san? You okay?" I shook my head, and with that, shook off the thought. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just zoned out for a minute there." Lance leaned over and caught what I had been looking at. "Eh, it's just a little scratch. After we're done, we can just slap a bandage on it." "Yeah," was my solemn reply. It's not that I disagreed with him, or anything, it's just that the thought hadn't left my mind entirely, and it left me in a brooding kind of haze.

* * *

A few hours later, the class finally ended, and I had barely broken a sweat. Lance was mumbling about how many replacements he would have to buy before there was a chance of fixing the room so we could actually use it, rather than having me 'prance around like pretty little fucking ballerina, like the pretty little fucking princess and her handsome little fucking prince and the fucking little antagonist in some motherfucking cliche shitty production made in the 70's', as Lance had so... imaginatively... put it. I think he's just pissed about the funds he'll lose to this.

He'll get over it.

I tossed a goodbye over my shoulder to a sulking grown man, cradling a broken car in his arms like it was his child - which kind of crept me out, but considering he spent money on it... - and rushed to rejoin the rest of the class as their class finished up, slinging my backpack over my my shoulder as I arrived. I got there as soon as Shura-sensei had finished saying something to them.

"Am I barging in on something?" I felt a bit cold, although that may have been the circuitry, as well. Lance said that he had to use a certain type of hybrid metal found in Gehenna that was incapable of heating up, so if I burst into flames, they wouldn't melt. That also meant that my blood wouldn't warm it up any, so if it, say, bumped into my skin or something, it would feel like I was being touched with cold metal.

Because that's exactly what was happening. Anyway, getting back to the matter at hand...

"It's nothing, Kuwaemasu-san. Just reminding everyone to keep at it. Don't you give up on me, either." Shura-sensei nodded, but her eyes said otherwise. "Hai, Shura-sensei." I nodded, deciding to go along with it, for the sake of avoiding the tension in the room becoming any thicker. If it does get any thicker, I think I might literally die.

If I don't, I might literally kill myself because I would always get shivers down my spine about it. Annoying little shivers.

The other classmates remained still for a moment, as though afraid to break the room's tension, but then they all locked gazes momentarily and moved simultaneously, which slightly eased the tension, but only slightly because Shura-sensei just kept standing there and staring blankly.

A few minutes later, though, us students left the room and were going to go do whatever it was we did after cram school. For me, it meant going back to the dorm and making sure I remember everything Lance taught me about everything about demons, or else the last few years will have been for nothing, and I truly am just a waste of a soul and body. To the others, it probably meant hanging out at the park, or going somewhere with a friend, or something like that. Sure enough, the group steadily became smaller. Shiemi was the first to go, saying that she needed to help her mother run the shop. I hope she's been rebuilding her bond with her mother; Even while I was here as Okumura Rin, the only thing I every found out about their relationship was just what happened in the garden that night with the dekalp. Izumo left after that, not bothering to tell where she was off to. She's probably going to meet with Paku, though. Those two are tightly knit. Suguro and Shima left after that, inviting Konekomaru to come along, but he politely declined and stayed with me. All the way back to the dorm.

"I thou-"

"I thou-"

We both startled each other, having spoken at the same time. My backpack almost jolted.

Almost.

"Ehh... you go first, Konekomaru-san." He remained silent for a second or two, before saying, "I thought you'd be off somewhere, doing something, like everything else." I shook my head. "I thought you would be doing the same thing as well."

"Then what were you going to do?" "Study. You?" "I was going to study, too." We both held each other's gaze for a few moment, until Konekomaru spoke in a relieved tone, a small smile occupying his face. "It's nice to know that there's someone who shares the same after-school activity with me." "You've never gone with Suguro-san and Shima-san anywhere after school?" "Only during the summer months. If it's any other time, I'll always decline and usually spend the next few hours by myself." "Well, I guess neither of us are going to be by themselves after-school, anymore, then?" "I guess not." We both shared a little chuckle, and made idle chit-chat all the way upstairs. Even while we were studying, we continued talking. Occasionally, Konekomaru would ask me a question about something, and I would explain it to him similarly to the way he had explained meisters to me, and he would end up with a small frown, though I'm not sure why. Even after studying, we just sat on the beds, talking excitedly like two old drunk men, laughing whenever we had the oxygen to spare.

I wish I had this kind of relationship with Konekomaru while I was still Okumura Rin; though I guess that would not have been possible. For one, I was in the abandoned dorms and not in the normal dorms, with Konekomaru, so we never would've had to time to get deep into a conversation unless by special circumstances, and as Okumura Rin I was the son of his parents' murderer. Not that I'm not Satan's kid anymore - that's a part of myself I can never erase, no matter how hard I try - but I can definitely suppress it by Gehennian technology combined with the most advanced Assiah technology; technology not known to the modern townsfolk and only known to the exorcists. I'm not sure if it'll last forever, but I'm quietly praying that it is.

At one point in the conversation, I paused, and realized something. Konekomaru looked at me with a confused expression, so I quickly explained that I needed to get a new eye-patch, seeing as the one I had was rather annoying. Konekomaru thought about for a moment, and then suggested that we both go on the weekend, saying that he had to go somewhere in the morning on that day, but that we could meet up at lunch, grab a bite to eat together, and find me a new eye-patch. Thought surprised, I accepted the proposal readily.

Eventually, we turned the lights out and Konekomaru passed out purely from the amount of energy he had spent in the conversation. I've hardly ever seen him this enthusiastic.

"Why am I doing this?" I whispered quietly to myself as I laid on my back in bed. "I'm only going to have to leave them again..."

I gasped, raising a shaking hand with the index finger outstretched to me face, and ran it under my eye, then pulling it farther from my face and looking at it.

"A tear?" I gasped again, the lump in my throat making me unable to breathe properly. The lone river continued down my face, the other eye having lacked the glands. That night, I quietly cried myself to sleep, whilst my mind was a haze of confusion and sadness that I didn't understand the origin of. Yet...For the life of me...

In the past year, I can't remember ever a time...

That I cried.

* * *

 **I'm going to read this later, find 15 or so typos, cry about it, and go back to sleep.**

 **Oui, I'm friggin' tired. Sorry for the foul use of language, but this story is rated T. You'll live. (I think.)**

 **Bye now!**


	6. Night Time Thoughts

He sat on the bed, wide awake and unsure of what to do. Konekomaru was sound asleep on his side of the room. His backpack was still on the floor, dynamos inactive and Kuro silent. Thoughts raced in his head but allowed him no peace.

 _"Hey, Kuwaemasu-san?"_

 _"Eh, Shima-san? What is it?"_

 _"Just... Thanks."_

 _"Kuwaemasu-san!"_

 _"Yeah, Konekomaru-san?"_

 _"Wanna hang out after scbool today?"_

 _"Yo, Kuwaemasu-san!"_

 _"What's up, Ryuji-san?"_

 _"Mind coming over later?"_

 _"Kuwaemasu-san, Kuwaemasu-san!"_

 _"Yes, Moriyama-san?"_

 _"Would you like to visit my garden?"_

 _"Hey, Kuwaemasu-san."_

 _"Hey, Izumo-san. What's up?"_

 _"Nothing. Just wanted to see how you're doing."_

 _"Kuwaemasu-san?"_

 _"Hai, Okumura-sensei?"_

 _"Just wanted to congratulate you on your grade."_

 _"Ey, kid."_

 _"Yes, Shirigakure-sensei?"_

 _"...Yer a good kid, y'know that?"_

He clenched his jaw and gripped his hair at the memories. Why were they being so nice to him? Because they felt bad for before (lies) or because who he was now was _better_ than Okumura Rin. He told himself that it must be the latter, but deep down inside, he couldn't be sure. He hated that he didn't know, and he hated his indecisiveness. And there was no one to turn to. Lance would never pick up at this time of night and there was no one else who knew about all this. It wasn't the smartest thing he decided to do in that moment, leaving the dorms well after curfew, but he needed to clear his mind if he wanted any chance of sleep.

He let his feet carry him wherever they so pleased, meanwhile pondering the situation in his head. It was pleasant, but... Temporary. He'd graduate and never see them again. And they'd never know that he had re-entered their lives, and stolr away under the radar, leaving nothing in his wake.

Upwards he looked, at the stars and the moon. An ethereal sort of beauty, they held, lights twinkling above him. The _heavens._ He had to wonder if Shiro was up there, watching him. He couldn't imagine him being proud of his decision, but he couldn't imagine him being angry, just... Disappointed. He frowned at the thought. Never had liked it when Shiro had been made at him, but it was worse when he was disappointed.

 _"I'm not angry, just... Disappointed."_ Shiro had been tired and fed up that day. He hadn't had the energy to blow up; only to tell him that and walk off. He had never felt such a gaping pit of guilt befote then, in the pit of his stomach. But, where he stood now, it didn't matter. What was done was done, and it was out of his hands now.

It was, wasn't it?


	7. Revelation

**Go back and read the last chapter! I changed it! No more swamp because IDK where I was going with it.**

* * *

Dash. Dash. Dodge. Parry. Forward. Forward. Parry. Repeat. Lance had started to get the room in order, but as of right now he was sparring hand-to-hand with Lance; purposely not hitting him but also not backing off, and he did what Lance said when he did.

"Parry! Forward! Forward! Parry! Again!" But it was starting to get boring, and he could hear his classmates chatting loudly in the other room - quite clearly. His nerves were getting riled up but said nothing yet as Lance pulled away, saying something that didn't quite reach his ears. He didn't feel fully there - he was tired and wanted nothing more than to get a meal in him.

The dynamos twitched erratically, all the way off to the side of the room.

"Eh? Something wrong, Rin-kun?" He suddenly froze up, becoming apprehensive, and glared at his older companion.

"Don't call me that."

"It's easier than saying Kuwaemasu-san," he countered with a slight whine in his voice.

"I said no," he ground out between his teeth.

"It's easier. 'Sides, doesn't matter. We're along."

"Fine," he growled out. "Say it in public and you're a dead man."

"Then you'd be back at square one," he countered once more. "What's got you so worked up, anyway? Why does you old name bother you so much?"

"Because!" He started exasperatedly. "When I was Okumura Rin, I was useless! I couldn't do anything right, and everyone hated me! I was going to be executed sooner or later; everyone knew it." He took a breath. "But Torēsā Kuwaemasu can actually do something! The way I am now isn't a complete waste of flesh! And even then, it's only because I let you put a bunch of metal in me!" He finally finished, taking in a short gasp. Lance had remained quiet for the small fit, and let a moment of silence pass before he spoke up.

"Alright," he had said softly. "Alright. I won't call you that anymore." He paused. "I'm dismissing you early. Go cool off, okay?"

"Thanks," he responded quietly, moving to gather his things.

* * *

Shirigakure-sensei sent me to get Kuwaemasu-kun. I've been curious about what he's been doing in his private training room, but I'll ask him later, or maybe he'll tell me in his own time. As I neared, I could hear someone that sounded distinctly like him, and yet distinctly like a voice, I thought I'd never hear again start to yell.

"Becuase! When I was Okumura Rin, I was useless!" My mind blanked. I shouldn't have eavesdropped, and I shouldn't have stood there at the door and waited to hear more. But I did.

"I couldn't do anything right, and I hated me! I was going to be executed sooner or later; everyone knew it." I could hear his voice falter a bit, and he paused. I waited. He continued.

"But Torēsā Kuwaemasu can actually do something! The way I am now isn't a complete waste of flesh! And even then, it's only because I let you put a bunch of metal in me!" I couldn't listen anymore. I couldn't handle it. I ran away, down the hall and back to where everyone else was. Bon noticed me immediately.

"Koneko! What happened?" I looked up and vaguely felt a wetness on the corners of my eyes.

"I-It's _Rin..._ "


	8. Confrontation

The others stared in horror as Konekomaru parroted their friend's words to them. For a good moment, there was a stillness; nothing besides his sniffling. This was... groundbreaking information. And dammit, Rin had never planned on coming forward, did he? They couldn't blame him, but... did the past few months means nothing to him? Everything that had passed between them all?

So when he suddenly walked past, a bit hurriedly at that with an estranged expression, they weren't going to let him go that easily.

"Okumura Rin!" Suguro yelled, glaring at him. He had almost stopped but then continued as if he hadn't heard him. "Goddamit, I know you can hear me!" He yelled again, a noticeable red coloring his face. The other turned to face them all, faking confusion.

"Are you talking to me?" He questioned, pointing at himself a little.

"Like hell, you know I am!" He didn't notice how the other began to pale. "Why the hell would you do this?! Fake your own death!? Not say anything when you came back?!" The other swallowed nervously.

"S-Suguro-san..."

"I'm not done yet!" He cut him off immediately. "And then you just don't say anything and we have to find out about it because Koneko accidentally overheard! What kind of bull is that?!" He huffed, taking a breath. By now, Rin had hung his head a bit so his hair overshadowed his eyes, but there was a faint grin on his face - it was strange to see.

"The hell you laughing at?" Suguro growled out. Rin raised his head, and they all froze.

"Who's laughing?" He had said, barely above a whisper. And his eye - his eye... they held the same essence they did when they were blue. The same overwhelming sadness, the same _overwhelming unguarded emotion_ that they had before, and they wondered how they never noticed the similarity. He seemed to watch their expressions flicker for a moment before he spoke again.

"I... have to go..." And with that, he turned and began to leave. Suguro went to stop him, but Izumo grabbed his arm. He moved to ask her why she was stopping him, but she answered before he even opened his mouth.

"You both need to cool down," she said in a low voice. "Going after him now will only push him further away." He stayed at her for another moment before letting his arm fall to his side and watching the door shut behind his friend with a feeling of hopelessness.

* * *

This, of course, did not go unnoticed by Yukio. He was the first person they told, next to Shura, who had gone to use the bathroom. Now, they sat around a table in a solemn silence. Yukio was not taking the news well. He said nothing now; instead, he was tight-lipped and visibly distraught, a fearsome internal conflict playing out behind his unguarded eyes. It was strange to see him like that, but no one blamed him. Rin's death had hit him hardest - hell, he had watched him 'die'. He more than deserved this moment of leeway. After this carried on for a few more minutes, Shiemi's timid voice shattered the quiet.

"What are we doing to do now?" Her eyes flicked between each of her companions, looking for an answer. One came, but not from them.

"Help him," came the foreign voice, standing a few feet away, having gone unnoticed amidst their tension. There was a sad smile on his face, and he seemed to wait for someone to say something.

"You knew," Yukio said, glaring at him from the corners of his eyes. "I saw you before it happened - and you were there at the funeral. You knew about all this."

"I did," Lance confirmed with a slight bob of his head. "I did."

"You helped him plan the whole thing too, didn't you?"

"I did," he confirmed again.

"Why the hell would you do that?" He hissed.

"I saw him... I saw... his hopelessness, and..." he paused. "That wasn't what it was like at first. At first, we really were just friends, or acquaintances, or... whatever it was we were. And... one day, he let it slip he was in something called a cram school, so I told him about my job." He paused one again, forming the next sentence in his mouth. They waited. He spoke.

"Eventually, I let it slip about a project I was working on... I knew weapons. How I needed someone to wield it, but to go through tests and... implants... He begged me to let him do it. At first, I told him no, that it was experimental and I didn't want anything to happen to him... but he kept begging, and begging, and..." he went quiet.

"And what?" Yukio asked, tone softer.

"I... asked him, why he wanted it so much, and he..." he lowered his voice as he spoke his next words. "He told me that he was hopeless, and..." he gulped. "He... told me everything... absolutely everything. I had suspected some kind of depression or anxiety for awhile, but... nothing like what came out of his mouth. So, I... I thought I could help him... so I did. I helped him, the only way I could. But what he's doing now, it's... unhealthy. So please, help me." He finally finished, looking at all of them for a lingering moment, and when no one said anything else, he left. They watched him go.

* * *

Konekomaru wasn't sure what he would find when he went back to the dorm that night. Finding Rin, facing the wall and very much awake, was not very high on his list. He noticed him enter immediately.

"Please," he said softly. "I don't want to talk right now."

"Alright," the shorter had responded quietly, turning away from him and quietly going around doing the rest of his homework. Rin had remained quiet during the whole thing, and Konekomaru had decided to leave him well enough alone. He couldn't help his curiosity, though, and would be lying if he said it wasn't eating him up inside. When an hour or two had passed, he had been startled out of the silence by the other, who at this point he had thought was asleep.

"I know you're curious. I-I know. I just... can't, not yet..." He had said quietly, shifting a bit in place. _It's his way of apologizing for not saying anything,_ he realized idly.

"It's okay," he reluctantly responded. "Tell me when you're comfortable."

He had hummed a bit from his place on the bed.


	9. Twins and a Roomie

**Eyyyyyyyyyy**

* * *

Things were awkward, to say the least. But it wasn't his fault - they should've just minded their own business! He fidgeted in place at the thought. Then again, what was he to expect? Find out your classmate now was really your classmate from over a year ago who faked his own suicide? He hadn't had a lot of ideas as to how the situation may play out, but that hadn't really been what he expected. But now he was... uncomfortable. It had been three days since they found out, and... nobody was coming after him. The only person he'd seen since was Konekomaru, and he was giving him plenty of space. He hadn't heard from Lance either, just a text explaining that he would be gone for a few days for a meeting.

They still knew nothing. Nothing about his weapons, nothing about what exactly he let Lance do to him - hell, not even anything about Kuro. That, somehow, bothered him. Like a nauseating twinge, deep in the pit of his stomach. He turned on his back, staring listlessly at the ceiling. Classes had ended not too long ago, and unless his roomie was heading into town, Konekomaru would be coming through that door any minute now. Sure enough, the handle turned and the small boy stepped inside, the door closing behind him with a click.

"Hey," he greeted softly, as though tiptoeing across broken glass.

"Hey," the other returned, never moving from his place on the bed.

He had to admit, something had struck him as odd. He remembered, way back when, Konekomaru being absolutely terrified of him, but now... it was... more calm, almost? Passive? At first, he had brushed it aside, but the curiosity was beginning to overflow. It bothered him, perhaps more than it should have. He brought his hand up to finger idly at his eyepatch as he began to speak, quiet and soft.

"...Konekomaru-san?" He roommate jumped a little, startled by the sound of his voice.

"Hai?" Said roomie watched him intently, while Rin continued to stare up at the ceiling.

"Why..." he gulped, throat suddenly dry. "Why aren't you scared of me?" Konekomaru was quiet for a moment before he found the ability within himself to answer.

"I think..." he paused, choosing his next words carefully. "that... I never really was scared of you, yourself..." he glanced over at Rin, to see him watching quietly with an unreadable expression. He continued, looking away. "I-I think... I was afraid of the memory. That... it was never really... real, to me, the Blue Night... until I saw the flames, and..." he tried to think of what to say next, but he didn't need to. His thought process was broken off by a weak, sad chuckle. He looked over and saw Rin on his back again, forearm rested across his eyes. He waited to see what he would do; if he would speak. He did.

"Heh... if only we knew this back then, huh?" He croaked out, barely above a whisper. Konekomaru nodded in agreement.

"Yeah..." Silence ensued for a moment. Then, Konekomaru spoke again.

"Ri- uh... Kuwae... T-Tor..." he started.

"You... can call me Rin," he interrupted, speaking in a low voice. He hadn't budged from his position.

"Rin-san... I... I should've said this a long time ago, but... I'm sorry... for everything..."

"It's okay," Rin responded softly. "I.. forgave you all, a long time ago." Konekomaru shook his head.

"I'm sorry, but... I don't think you did. I think you just put it away and pretended nothing ever happened," he replied, an equally as soft tone in his voice. "Still... I'm sorry..." Rin let out a shaky sigh, and very quietly whispered:

"You have no idea how much that means to me..."

* * *

Yukio fidgeted on the bed in his dorm. His brother, whom he had believed to be dead, was somewhere in this building with him... and here he was, sitting and waiting [For what? He hadn't the slightest idea.] He had begrudgingly accepted the fact that, if he chased after him, it wouldn't produce anything good. He had to wait for him to come on his accord. There were so many things he wanted to say, to express - an angrier part of him to make sure Rin knew exactly what he had put him through and a softer, more caring part to show how happy and grateful he was that he was alive.

He gripped his hair and huffed in frustration, deciding to head into town and get himself a mineral water to get his mind off his brother for awhile. When he opened the door, though, he was met with the sight of Rin standing there, fist raised as though to knock on the door, and seeming paler than death, sweat beading along his hairline.

"O-Oh, uh... h-hey, um... Y-Y- I mean.. O-Okum..." he stopped, making a noise similar to a wheeze.

"...Rin..." Yukio mumbled breathlessly. There he was, standing before him. Here, in the guise that left him unaware that it was his brother before him all along. Speechless.

"U-Um..." he seemed to shift uncomfortably in place. "C-Can I, uh... come in?" It took Yukio a moment to register his words.

"O-Oh, um... sure." He stepped back to give him room to enter and shut the door once he did. Rin took a moment to glance around the room, mentally trying to calm down.

"Heh... You're as much of a neat freak as ever. Not much different from before, yeah?" He said quietly, not looking at Yukio.

"It is, without your side of the mess," Yukio responded, equally as quiet. Rin fiddled with his thumbs a moment.

"Right to it, huh?" He chuckled weakly but stopped upon seeing Yukio's expression. A combination of seriousness, and hurt.

"Rin... I know that it all... was hard on you, and I did very little to better the situation, but... to do this?" His arms flopped helplessly as his sides, voice frail. "Do you have any idea... how much I missed you? How hard it had been to watch you that day, how hard it was not to just walk away from the funeral... to find out it was all fake? An act?"

"I never doubted that you missed me," he started. "I was sorely tempted to, but I never did doubt it..."

"Then, knowing that I would... why?"

"I thought... it was the only way I would be good at anything. That you might not be proud of me for it all, but... you wouldn't be disappointed in me anymore, either." Yukio paused, deciding his next words.

"You were never a disappointment, Rin... there were times where I knew you could do better, and times where I knew you didn't always try your hardest... but I also knew that sometimes, that was your best, and it was the most I could've ever asked for. I was never disappointed in, Rin, and... I'm sorry if I ever made you feel that way," he said, with a certain tone in his voice Rin hadn't heard since they were children. He had his guard down. Rin watched him with big eyes, beginning to shine with unshed tears.

"Y-Yukio..."

"And... I'm sorry for everything else too... the lies, the secrets... the suspicion... I... I-I thought... kind of similarly to you, actually... I was always the weaker twin, and you always protected me, from everything. For once, I wanted to be able to protect you, and... I thought that by distancing myself, focusing all I had into it, I'd be able to do it sooner." He paused, a sad smile gracing his face. "I guess all I did was push you away and make the situation worse." He stopped, realizing he was about to go on a tangent. "I'm sorry, nii-san." He looked up to Rin, to see a silent tear begin to roll down his cheek. He tensed a bit, more following afterward.

"Th-The hell, Y-Yukio..." he started as he sniffled, trying to wipe them away. "I-I'm the big brother, remember? It's my j-job to protect you!" He exclaimed, trying to put on a fierce expression but unable to in the face of the open floodgates. Yukio smiled a bit, recognizing this side of Rin that continued to blabber, and decided to close the distance between them and bring him into a tight hug. Rin suddenly went quiet, mouth gaping. He closed it after a moment, allowing himself to cry and hang on tightly to his twin.


End file.
